Free
by prepare4trouble
Summary: Post-finale. Sabine visits Ezra's tower.


Sabine opened the door to the tower apprehensively, not sure exactly what she was going to find inside. It was silent, the air colder than she had expected. Now that she thought about it, it made sense; even with the door sealed, the wind would still whistle through the ventilation shaft. She could hear it even now. **  
**

The door closed behind her. Sabine folded her arms tightly and looked around the room that Ezra had used to call home. She hesitated, not sure why she had come here; what she had been looking for. She supposed some silly part of her had hoped to find him here. Or if not Ezra himself, something of him, something that might help. She realized now, that wasn't going to happen. Nothing would help right now.

"Hey, Ezra," she whispered, more to herself than to a person she knew wasn't there.

There was still so much of him there, though; things that had been his, things that for whatever reason he had never moved to his quarters on the Ghost. In the corner, a pile of machine parts gathered dust. A shelf to her left contained an eclectic collection of magazines and trinkets, no doubt liberated from their owners around the city, or found in the street.

She cast an eye over the collection. A broken piece of a thin gold chain. A wallet, completely empty, but good quality. Assorted bottles and jars, all empty and presumably salvaged from around the city. A child's stuffed tooka that she couldn't decide whether it was Ezra's, or again something that he had found. There was nothing of any real value; they were all simply items that he had acquired one way or another, and held onto until such time that they might come in useful.

Apparently, they never had.

Her sweeping gaze stopped suddenly on a book, partially disguised by the collection of wires stored on top of it. An honest-to-goodness book rather than an electronic version, one made with sheets of flimsi bound together between a solid cover. _That_ might have actually been worth something. They weren't made often anymore; they tended to be something of a collector's item.

Curious, she crossed the room in a few steps, reached out and touched it. It felt rough to the touch, textured. The cover was a dull red color, darker in some places than others, as though it had lain in the sun, partially covered until the rays bleached the exposed parts of the surface.

There was no title, not on the cover, nor on the spine. Curious, Sabine carefully pushed the wires from the top onto the shelf next to it, and picked it up. She opened the book, and found a blank page. Frowning, she turned the page and found herself staring at a sketch. Done with a single pencil, no color, it appeared to be the view from the tower, out over the grasslands to the city, and the sea beyond.

Sabine stared down at the page in surprise. It wasn't bad. Clumsy; the technique could have used work, but the artist had a good eye, and a steady hand. She turned the page again, hoping for more, and instead found doodles; spirals and boxes and loth-cat faces staring out from the page.

The third page was some sketches of stormtrooper helmets; she recognized them from Ezra's collection. Each one was labeled in Ezra's childish, clumsy hand. Again, the technique was lacking, but with time and practice, he could have improved a lot, and already he wasn't bad.

The fourth page was blank, and the fifth, and, disappointingly, the rest of the book. It was as though he had found it, come up with the idea of creating a sketchbook, and either forgotten, or never got around to using it again. Maybe because he had gotten caught up in a rebellion…

Sabine closed it with a sigh. Keeping it in her hands, she turned around to face the room. "You never told me you drew," she said.

No reply came, of course. She hadn't expected one, but the silence that answered her words felt so much worse than the one she had found there when she had arrived.

She sighed, and sat down on the bed. It wasn't really a bed, of course; it was three mismatched storage boxes pushed together, with a bedroll on the top, and a pillow for comfort. No blanket. Sabine shivered again as the wind rattled through the ventilation shaft.

"I shouldn't be surprised you didn't tell me," she continued. "There's a lot you never mentioned." Like the way he'd planned to end the battle; that he'd known in advance that he probably wasn't coming back, that he'd been so certain of if that he'd recorded that holo for them.

She supposed she should take comfort from that. Ezra had gone in with eyes wide open, he had known the probable outcome and he had decided to do it anyway. It should help, but it didn't. If she'd known what he was going to do, she would _never_ have helped him sneak away.

Or maybe she would. Ezra could be pretty convincing when he put his mind to it.

"I'm still mad with you," she said. "For the record. Kanan, I can forgive, but you were _right there_ when he… you _knew_ how it felt to watch that happen, to not be able to do anything about it. How could you do it to us again?"

She was crying now. She barely noticed until she heard the subtle sound of a teardrop falling onto the cover of the book resting on her lap. She looked down at it, surprised for a moment, then wiped it away. The saltwater spread in a thick line on the cover of the book, looking a more vivid shade of red for a moment until it began to dry. More tears were coming, and she knew already that she wouldn't be able to stop them. She placed the book on the bed next to her to protect it, then wiped angrily at her eyes.

"I'm not sad," she said. "I'm angry. And if you think for one second I'm actually crying over you…" her throat closed up again before she could finish, and a sob rose up from somewhere deep inside of her.

Kriff. Now she had started, she couldn't stop, like the dam had opened and she couldn't close it again, not until the reservoir she had been holding back was gone. She leaned forward, resting her head in her hands, and let it come. She needed this. She had needed it for some time now.

This was the first time she had been alone since it happened; truly alone. For the first time in she wasn't sure how long, she had slept in her own bed, in her own quarters the night before, but she hadn't been alone. Not really. It wasn't a large ship, and the internal walls weren't exactly soundproof. She couldn't give herself over to the grief, not with Hera and Zeb so close. Not with Chopper ready to dole out his unique but oddly sweet brand of comfort at the slightest hint of sorrow. She didn't want comfort. She didn't want someone to hug her, or to ask if she was okay, or what they could do to help.

She wanted her family back.

This time last week, they had been safe, complete. They had been separated from Hera by the space that between Lothal and Yavin IV, but they had all been okay. Now, Kanan was dead and Ezra was… she didn't even know.

That was the worst part, in a way. With Kanan, at least she _knew_. There was no doubt in her mind, no possibility of hope that could turn out to be false. She had seen the explosion that had taken his life, she had watched it happen with her own eyes, seen it over and over in her memories and — when she was able to make herself sleep — her nightmares in the days since. Nobody could have survived that, not even Kanan. But at least she knew that.

Ezra _might_ have survived. He had certainly believed when he had made that holo that he was going to come home one day, he had said as much. She didn't see how it was possible, but if anybody could pull that off, it was Ezra. With his talent for making friends with anybody; anything, if anyone could ensure the purrgil that had whisked him away to who-knows-where ensured his survival, it was Ezra.

But… he could be dead. Floating lifeless among the stars; a sacrifice made to free the homeworld he had loved so much.

"You're such an idiot," she whispered. She forced her eyes tightly closed in an effort to stem the flow of tears. It didn't work, as she had known it wouldn't. "First thing I do when I see you again will be to slap you for doing this to us. Don't think I won't."

She would, too. But then she would wrap her arms around him and she didn't know how long it would be before she would be able to bring herself to let him go. When she finally did, though, she was going to hit him again, harder this time.

"What were you thinking?" she said, speaking under her breath, allowing her words to disappear into the silence of the tower. "I hope you're pleased with yourself. I hope you're…" her throat closed of its own accord, stopping the words, constricting them into a voiceless sob. Her breath hitched and tears began to fall again, and Sabine ignored it. "I just hope you're okay," she finished. "You'd better be, because I want to be able to kill you for this, so…"

Her face was damp with tears. They dripped unchecked from her chin, some running down her neck and soaking into the fabric underneath her armor, others dropping down to land in her lap.

She took a deep breath and gave herself a moment to calm down. It didn't work. She was surrounded by him here, just as she was on the Ghost; she could see Ezra and Kanan everywhere there, things that had been theirs, places that they had sat, or stood, memories of moments that had seemed trivial at the time, but were so important now, replaying over and over in her mind.

At least here she was spared that part. And she was spared the glances of the people in the street in the city. Everywhere she went in Capital City, she saw happiness; celebration, and as much as she wanted to, she couldn't bring herself to join in. People walked with a spring in their step that she had never seen there before; that she had rarely seen _anywhere_. There was destruction; death and pain had been reigned down by Thrawn's attack, but despite everything, despite the pollution that choked the air and the scars left behind on the surface of the planet by the Empire and the Mining Guild, despite knowing it probably wouldn't last, the people felt free. Many of them would never have had that before, the rest probably barely remembered it after so many years of occupation.

 _Ezra_ had done that for them.

"They're starting to rebuild," she said. " _We_ are. The Empire could come back any day, but we're doing it anyway." It was going to take years to make the city what it had been, and probably longer than that to repair the other damage — to the atmosphere, to the ecosystem — but they were going to do it, because Ezra was counting on her. "I'm not going to let you down."

But it wasn't easy, because even surrounded by all that hope, she couldn't stop crying.

"Hera's talking about leaving," she said. "Zeb too, probably. Not yet, they're going to stay for a while, but there are other worlds to liberate. They'll be back, but I'm going to stay, help out…" she sighed. Part of her wanted to go with them, if only to ensure that the family wasn't split further. She wasn't going to do that, though. Not yet. Maybe in the future, when Lothal was recovered and there was no more work for her to do, but she was in this for the long haul. "I didn't agree to this, by the way," she added. "You kinda sprung that on me with your disappearing act, so thanks for that."

Honestly, if Ezra was here with her, she didn't know what she might have decided. If he had come back, he would have stayed. She knew that without a shadow of a doubt. Would she have stayed with him? Probably not. She would have been back, as often as she could manage. She would have watched the planet return to its former glory, and she would have asked him, again and again, whether he had done enough, whether he was ready to return to the fight, and every time, he would have said no.

For Ezra, it had always been about Lothal.

This was his world, his people, and he had been willing to die to see it free of its oppressors. She hoped — desperately hoped — that it hadn't come to that, but whatever had been waiting for him on the other side of that hyperspace jump, Ezra had gone into it counting on her, and she wasn't going to let him down.

She opened the book again and looked at Ezra's sketch of the view from his tower. It wasn't entirely accurate, she noticed now. The city was larger than it appeared in reality, the buildings taller, different shapes. At first she had taken it for an error, the result of an inexperienced hand, a mistake in perspective, but she realized now that it was not. The drawing had never been of the city as it was, but of what it could be. Perhaps even — because she didn't understand the Force but she knew it had sent Ezra visions from time to time — perhaps even what it _would_ be.

A sound outside startled her, and she put the book to one side again and walked cautiously to the door. The sun was setting outside the tower; soon it would be dark. The moons hung in the sky already, shining down on a planet that felt, for the first time, as though it might have a future. She looked down to the grass below, and caught a moving shape that made her freeze in surprise. A loth-wolf. It turned and looked up at her, its white fur almost glowing in the twilight.

She stared down at the creature, and it looked back, locking eyes with her for a moment before turning away. She thought it was going to walk into the distance, but instead it sat down on the ground just outside the tower, facing out into the land beyond, as though keeping watch. Sabine frowned, then shivered; despite the wind working its way inside through the ventilation system, it was still much colder outside on the ledge around the tower. Plus, there was a wolf outside. She didn't think it meant her any harm, but it was as good a reason as any to stay where she was for the night, wait out the wave of grief that she knew could overcome her again at any moment, and return to the Ghost in the morning.

"Ezra, your friend's outside," she murmured as she re-entered the tower. She didn't expect an answer of course, and it was a surprise to get one in the form of a quiet mewing. She looked down just in time to see a white loth-cat slip inside the door after her. It wound its way once around her ankles, then stalked across the room and leaped up onto the bed.

Sabine sighed. She sat down on the edge of the bed, moving the sketchbook out of the way, where it would be safe. She reached out and ran her fingers over the loth-cat's fur. It was smoother than she had expected. The creature purred appreciatively.

Ezra was the one with the ability to make friends with every creature he ever met, she didn't have that talent. The one seemed to like her well enough, though. She thought of the wolf apparently keeping guard outside; Ezra had told her that the wolves were in tune with Lothal itself, and a cat had originally led them to the wolves. Not _this_ cat though. Unless… it _had_ been a white cat, maybe it was the same one, and it had brought its wolf friend along.

If these creatures looked after Lothal, and that was her intention too, perhaps they had simply come to keep her company.

Or maybe she was tired and emotional and looking for meaning where there was none.

"What are you doing here?" she asked, her fingertips massaging the warm fur behind its ears.

The loth-cat responded by turning a few times on the spot, then lying down on the bed.

Sabine frowned. She didn't have the heart to put it outside in the cold, especially not if her theory was correct, so it looked as though she had a roommate for the night. She lay down on the bed, not bothering to remove her boots, or the rest of her armor. It was designed to be comfortable after all, and she had slept in it often enough to be used to it. She rested her head on the pillow and tried to get comfortable. The cat snuggled in a little closer, so that she could feel the warmth of its body against hers.

Her hand continued to caress the soft fur as she allowed her eyes to close. Tomorrow, she was going to rejoin the cleanup effort; together, they were going to put the planet back together. When Ezra returned, it would be to the Lothal he had dreamed of seeing: safe, happy, and above all, free.

Or better yet, maybe Ezra would come back and help them with it, instead of letting _her_ do all the work.

"I'm still mad at you, by the way," she whispered. Lothal could send her all the cats and the wolves it wanted, Ezra was still going to get that slap when she saw him again.

The cat purred, enjoying the feeling of her fingers smoothing its fur, and she felt herself begin to relax. She felt calmer than she had in weeks. Things weren't okay, they were so far from okay that she shouldn't even imagine it, but for the first time in a long time she could believe they might get there one day.

She had been running on adrenaline and caf for days now, and finally she allowed herself to give in to the exhaustion. Sleep claimed her quickly, and she slipped into a thankfully dreamless sleep.


End file.
